In the interest of preserving history many years ago, CAO Dale Jones and Engineering guy Sam Cerra (yes, my Sam) rescued a cache of photo plaques from a small enclosed space on the second floor of the 1928 city hall. That tiny room had operated as a projection booth in the 1940s—when the city allowed the Meralta Theatre to show movies in the second floor auditorium of city hall. A fire had disabled the Meralta in the next block and there was a wartime moratorium on building, so the city “bellied up to the bar” so to speak to make sure locals had an entertainment venue.

The plaques had been displayed in city hall early on, and offered a “photo essay” of elected officials up to 1960. In an effort to document history in an interesting way, the Culver City Historical Society worked with the city administration to bring back those plaques with the intent of bringing them up to date. City employees worked out a system for display in the council chambers, and Sony Pictures provided a curtain for the dramatic unveiling. We asked Ed Little to attend the meeting. He was the only living former council member who was pictured!

Today, the society is working diligently with the city to bring the list of local elected officials up to date and find photos of all who have served as trustees/council members of Culver City. We have earmarked funds to get photos reproduced and permaplaqued on wood. This has become quite an exercise, and almost taken on a life of its own…

This has presented an opportunity to go back through original files to validate data. There have been a few surprises. It seems V.R. Day, who is pictured on the west wall of the chambers was succeeded by his wife, who was appointed to fill his unexpired term in the 1920s. No picture found yet of Belle Wygant Day, however…and although all five members of the Board of Trustees faced recall in the 1920s, the entire effort failed. In 1945, however, council members Hahn and La Comb were both recalled. No pictures of them found either!

So, personally and on behalf of your Culver City Historical Society, I would like to challenge our fine citizens to help us make this council photo record complete. We have recently accessed photos of Mike Balkman, Jozelle Smith, Paul Netzel, Richard Ross Brundo, Albert Vera, Ron Perkins, Richard Alexander, Ed Wolkowitz, David Hauptman and Paul Jacobs, as well as the recently retired council members Corlin, Gross and Rose. But we NEED photos of many others, like B.J. Higuera, W.S. McNeir, Earl Bobier, David E. Clark, John Lehman, Philip Stephon, Francis Robert Reeves, Ray Haskell, Thomas J. Carroll, Edward Castle, A. Segrell, Gerald Margolis, Harlan Thompson, Raymond O’Neal, Robert Unruhe, Garland Garrett, William Botts, Martin Lotz, Richard Pachtman, Dr. James Boulgarides, Steven Gourley, William Douglas, Sandra Levin, John Carl Brogdon, and there might be more!

If you can help, please contact the society at 310-253-6941, or info@CulverCityHistoricalSociety. org, or call Steve Rose at the Chamber of Commerce at 310- 287-3850, or email me at julie@cerraenterprises. com. We can scan the photos at the Archives while you wait!